Walking The Walk

I retired from my professional career last week.  For 38 years I've worked in jobs that have required me to work long hours, manage multiple projects with multiple groups, and manage employees and their workloads.  They've all been high stress jobs with monstrous workloads--including the one I just retired from.  I'd been in that job for 21 years.  I'd say I average about 50 hours a week.  I worked evenings when necessary.  I worked weekends when we were behind (which was often).  I'm a morning person, so I've always been the first one there.  I've usually worked several hours before the first person arrived in the office.  Taking vacation wasn't easy, and I usually had to take it a day or two at a time because taking longer periods of time off put my whole team behind. On top of that, my wife and I have raised a family--I've got a grown daughter who is out on her own, and a my youngest is a high school senior.  I've served on the school...

"Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went off to a solitary place, where he prayed. " ~Mark 1:35 About a year ago I wrote a piece called Clear Your Head!   I wrote about how I took a day off, and packed a cooler with water, took my Bible and my journal and went out to a nice, quiet, wooded spot in a local park. My head was full, and I needed to sort a few things out.  And I needed a lot of help from the Lord.  My life was just too busy, and too noisy, and too distracted, and too chaotic to hear what the the Spirit was saying to me, and I knew I needed to find that quiet spot and stay there until I had worked through the problems I was having.  I needed guidance.  So I went, and I prayed, and I pondered, and I listened, and spent most of the day sitting at a picnic table doing that. No phone.  No iPad.  Not a single thing to distract me.  And that one day made a huge difference.  Much more than...

Sometimes we don't spend enough time looking in the mirror. We know that in our hearts we're saved. We go to church on Sunday. We try and do the right things in our life. We believe in Jesus. The question is--are we followers of Jesus? Jesus set us an example not only to read about and to acknowledge, but to follow. As we mature as Christians, we should aspire to become more and more like the model Jesus set for us. Do you? It's not easy being a Christian, because we live in a world that's contrary in so many ways to what we believe. To be a Christian, we have to accept this idea that we're living in the world, but we're part of a very different world. We're members of God's Kingdom.  And God's way is a very different way that the way of the secular world. We have a tendency sometimes to overlook areas of our life that are inconsistent with our faith. We give ourselves "carve outs."   Maybe there are things in your job that put you in awkwa...

A few years ago, a friend of mine decided he was going to retire.  He'd put in his 30 years, and he was the right age, and he decided it was time to go.  I asked him what he was going to do after he retired.  He said, "not work!"  He said he'd spent all of his life working, and he wanted to spend the rest of it relaxing.   I hear people say this a lot.  How they've "spent" their life.  How they're going to "spend" the rest of it.  There was always something about that idea that bothered me, but I could never put my finger on what it was.  Until now. Because now I'm that age.  I've put my time in.  And I'm old enough I can retire.  I'm thinking about these things.   With one difference. I don't plan on "spending" the rest of my life.  I've not "spent" my life up to this point.  I have a different perspective about life.  I've always looked at life as something we should invest in, not spend. I...

What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.  ~Ecclesiastes 1:9  One of the most difficult challenges we experience, is navigating the constant and continual changes we experience in life.  Just about the time we get used to things being one way, something changes.  And there's a mix of good changes, and bad changes.  Things that bring us joy and things that bring us sadness.  Sunshine and rain. We celebrate a new job.  There's a new baby in the family.  Maybe we move to a new town and begin a new adventure.  Those are all things that can bring us joy.  But sometimes we suffer losses as well.  Somebody we love passes away.  We find ourselves in a bad situation in our finances.  We have a relationship that begins to fail.  We have a medical issue we're dealing with.    And sometimes we will get into a cycle in life where we become overwhelmed with all...

" Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen."  ~Ephesians 4:29 It's always better to be part of what's right with the world, than part of what's wrong. And it's easy to tell which side your on by just looking at how you interact with other people.  What your attitude towards things are. How you live your life. If you're complaining all the time, you may be part of the problem. If you're unhappy all the time, you may be part of the problem. If you spend more time focused on and pointing out what other people are doing wrong than on what you're doing . . . you guessed it.  You may be part of the problem. We spend an inordinate amount of time focused on what we don't have.  Focused on people that make us mad.  Thinking about the things that aren't going exactly right instead of appreciating the things that are. What if...

" Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, think about these things." ~Philippians 4:8   When was the last time you left the house without your phone?  Or your iPad?  Or your iWatch?  When was the last time you were in an environment where there wasn't a screen within easy reach?  Or there wasn't a radio on, or music playing through your earbuds, or a TV playing in the background?   I was in a ZOOM call just over a year ago, and I was at the same time carefully wording an email response to an delicate inquiry on another screen, AND texting back and forth with my co-worker on something that was going on in her area she needed help with.  And then somebody asked me a question in that ZOOM call . . . and I'd only half-heard the question, and of course answered a question that was...